1. Field of Invention
The field of the currently claimed embodiments of this invention relates to systems for assessing fluid flow, and more particularly to optical interferometry systems for assessing blood flow.
2. Discussion of Related Art
Various techniques exist in the art for measuring fluid flow, but each has its drawbacks. Doppler frequency shift and interframe speckle variance of optical coherence tomography (OCT) images have been used in blood flow detection [1, 2]. Optical coherence Doppler tomography (ODT) allows quantitative blood flow measurement; however, it is not able to measure flow in a plane that is normal to the imaging beam. Speckle variance OCT (svOCT) has higher sensitivity for the visualization of microvasculature; however, it is insensitive to the change of flow speed [3]. There thus remains a need for a technique for measuring fluid flow that is normal to the imaging beam and sensitive to the change of flow speed.